


Shadow Man

by Ealasaid



Series: A City In Shadows [1]
Category: Homestuck, Problem Sleuth (Webcomic)
Genre: AU, Gen, Mobsterswitch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-16
Updated: 2011-11-16
Packaged: 2017-10-26 03:46:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/278320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ealasaid/pseuds/Ealasaid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s silly to say you built Midnight City, because it isn’t true in the least.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shadow Man

Long before you were Peccant Scofflaw, you were Jules Nero: charismatic right hand to the Black Queen. Now  _that_  had been a hell of a thing.

You scrapped through life in the palace, all backroom deals and under-the-table payments to get shit done. There was not much of an alternative: the queen, endlessly patient, tolerated little. The memories of the few times when you hadn’t been able to meet her exacting orders were not pleasant— a month locked in a pitch-black, tiny cell; being chained to his desk for a week with no sustenance; private “counseling” sessions that went on for days at a time.

In return, you suppose, the power you received was adequate. Shadow magic’s nothin’ to sneeze at, after all, even if it practically makes you a patch of the stuff. Besides that, there was the enjoyment of manipulating the other political strugglers and the satisfaction of brokering a compromise between militant generals. Of creating treaties that subtly favored the Dersites over the Prospitans on the rare times that a truce was needed. The chance to employ your skills in an endless challenge, negotiating a razor-thin precipice where the only people to place a— hah— shadow of trust in were your two some-time allies, Prescient Inventor and Aggressing Dragoon. 

Being in the center of the Queen’s advisers and intelligence made it easy to find the perfect opportunity to take her down. You would have just exiled her— it would have been far more fun to imagine her  _knowing_  she lost it all because of you— but the Inventor had argued against that, saying it was safer for her to be dead. And he was right, you suppose— she only lives in your memories, and half the time it comes to mind you’re reliving that last fight and the delicious sensation of crushing her utterly.

It’s silly to say you built Midnight City, because it isn’t true in the least. You manipulated others to do it for you, making it a city where Dersites and Prospitans could live together after the war finally destroyed the old lands— and then you came in and organized the underworld of crime when the city was firmly established.

You don’t rule Midnight City like you could have. You rule it like you should, like you ruled Derse— by pulling strings and slipping information where it can do the best good; by compromising with your enemies and writing treaties that subtly favor your side over the others’.

You watch as those who claim to be the law try to take you down. They say you’re breaking the law, going around it, working against it— but in reality you’re simply outside the reach of the law. And when they come close to dragging what you were into the light, you charm them all to hell and cheerfully slit their throats in the dark.


End file.
